Ecclesiastes 6:3

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Ecclesiastes 6:1–5 · Berean Standard Bible

1 There is another evil I have seen under the sun, and it weighs heavily upon mankind:

2 God gives a man riches, wealth, and honor, so that he lacks nothing his heart desires; but God does not allow him to enjoy them. Instead, a stranger will enjoy them. This is futile and a grievous affliction.

3 A man may father a hundred children and live for many years; yet no matter how long he lives, if he is unsatisfied with his prosperity and does not even receive a proper burial, I say that a stillborn child is better off than he.

4 For a stillborn child enters in futility and departs in darkness, and his name is shrouded in obscurity.

5 The child, though neither seeing the sun nor knowing anything, has more rest than that man,

Hebrew words

Data created by STEPBible.org based on work at Tyndale House Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).

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Cross-references

The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge lists these related verses. Scripture text comes from the Berean Standard Bible.

Genesis 33:5

When Esau looked up and saw the women and children, he asked, “Who are these with you?” Jacob answered, “These are the children God has graciously given your servant.”

1 Samuel 2:20

And Eli would bless Elkanah and his wife, saying, “May the LORD give you children by this woman in place of the one she dedicated to the LORD.” Then they would go home.

1 Samuel 2:21

So the LORD attended to Hannah, and she conceived and gave birth to three sons and two daughters. Meanwhile, the boy Samuel grew up in the presence of the LORD.

2 Kings 10:1

Now Ahab had seventy sons in Samaria. So Jehu wrote letters and sent them to Samaria to the officials of Jezreel, to the elders, and to the guardians of the sons of Ahab, saying:

1 Chronicles 28:5

And of all my sons—for the LORD has given me many sons—He has chosen Solomon my son to sit on the throne of the kingdom of the LORD over Israel.

2 Chronicles 11:21

Rehoboam loved Maacah daughter of Absalom more than all his wives and concubines. In all, he had eighteen wives and sixty concubines, and he was the father of twenty-eight sons and sixty daughters.

Esther 5:11

Haman recounted to them his glorious wealth, his many sons, and all the ways the king had honored and promoted him over the other officials and servants.

Psalms 127:4

Like arrows in the hand of a warrior, so are children born in one’s youth.

Psalms 127:5

Blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them. He will not be put to shame when he confronts the enemies at the gate.

Proverbs 17:6

Grandchildren are the crown of the aged, and the glory of a son is his father.

Ecclesiastes 5:17

Moreover, all his days he eats in darkness, with much sorrow, sickness, and anger.

Ecclesiastes 5:18

Here is what I have seen to be good and fitting: to eat and drink, and to find satisfaction in all the labor one does under the sun during the few days of life that God has given him—for this is his lot.

Ecclesiastes 5:19

Furthermore, God has given riches and wealth to every man, and He has enabled him to enjoy them, to accept his lot, and to rejoice in his labor. This is a gift from God.

Genesis 47:9

“My travels have lasted 130 years,” Jacob replied. “My years have been few and hard, and they have not matched the years of the travels of my fathers.”

2 Kings 9:35

But when they went out to bury her, they found nothing but her skull, her feet, and the palms of her hands.

Esther 7:10

So they hanged Haman on the gallows he had prepared for Mordecai. Then the fury of the king subsided.

Esther 9:14

So the king commanded that this be done. An edict was issued in Susa, and they hanged the ten sons of Haman.

Esther 9:15

On the fourteenth day of the month of Adar, the Jews in Susa came together again and put to death three hundred men there, but they did not lay a hand on the plunder.

Isaiah 14:19

But you are cast out of your grave like a rejected branch, covered by those slain with the sword, and dumped into a rocky pit like a carcass trampled underfoot.

Isaiah 14:20

You will not join them in burial, since you have destroyed your land and slaughtered your own people. The offspring of the wicked will never again be mentioned.

Jeremiah 22:19

He will be buried like a donkey, dragged away and thrown outside the gates of Jerusalem.

Jeremiah 36:30

Therefore this is what the LORD says about Jehoiakim king of Judah: He will have no one to sit on David’s throne, and his body will be thrown out and exposed to heat by day and frost by night.

Ecclesiastes 4:3

But better than both is he who has not yet existed, who has not seen the evil that is done under the sun.

Job 3:16

Or why was I not hidden like a stillborn child, like an infant who never sees daylight?

Psalms 58:8

Like a slug that dissolves in its slime, like a woman’s stillborn child, may they never see the sun.

Matthew 26:24

The Son of Man will go just as it is written about Him, but woe to that man by whom He is betrayed. It would be better for him if he had not been born.”